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Giant rattlesnakes, bats, and butterflies parade down the streets thanks to the Austin Bike Zoo. This mechanical menagerie is the brainchild of Jeremy Rosen, a UT grad with a degree in mechanical engineering. Rosen began the project with a simple goal of creating whimsical ways to play with bikes and ended up with a collection of intricately engineered animals. Part puppetry, part engineering, and all fun, the Austin Bike Zoo inspires wonder and delight everywhere they go.

“We have our own style and our own way of doing things,” Rosen said. “It really is original.”

Evan Voyles builds signs to last generations. Voyles is the sovereign sign-maker of South Congress – he hand-created and repurposed vintage signs for Magnolia Cafe, Homeslice, Soul, Stag, Creatures, Turquoise Door, Lucy’s Fried Chicken, Perla’s, Wahoo’s Fish Taco, Yard Dog and Uncommon Objects, the last two going on 20 years of age. Voyles started on his craft as a vintage neon sign collector and began to build signs when clients asked for specialized styles. Most recently, Voyles faced one of his biggest challenges yet: a 50-foot-tall replica of a 1952 Fender Telecaster for Austin Vintage Guitars. His personal artistry is on full display as he creates a new iconic masterpiece.

By empowering teens through creative writing, higher education, and creative arts, the Barrio Writers are reinstating the term “Barrio” to its original meaning – community – and embracing it. This writing community began with small workshops at El Centro Cultural de Mexico in Santa Ana, California and have now evolved into week-long, intensive programs on university campuses across America. At the end of the week, the Barrio Writers transform their stereotypes into a place of positivity and become empowered in their own words. Having also published several summers of writing into anthologies, they collaborate to promote diversity, cultivate creative writing, and offer a new voice in literature. Get information about events in Central Texas at barriowriters.org

Watch full performances from students who participated in the Austin program this summer.

Each time Annie Varghese starts a new cake, she feels like it’s her first one, and she won’t stop until she reaches perfection. She found her passion for cake sculpting from baking cakes for her children’s birthdays, and now she uses traditional flavors and ingredients to transform her cakes into a limitless, fictional world. She believes that every cake is a chance to explore her imagination, and she uses clean lines and balanced color tones to add details and create larger, more extravagant cakes. Her passion shows that cake isn’t just a sweet treat but an exciting art medium.

As a painfully shy child, Allyson Garo embraced theater and costuming to free her inner extrovert. Today, as the owner of local boutique Coco Coquette, Garo brings maximalist glamour to the masses. Showcasing a treasure trove of wigs and accessories, this splendid little shop helps Austinites find their inner diva.

Wig parties bring friends together to explore the art of incognito and inspire even the introverted to be flamboyant fashionistas. Garo shows how easy it can be to transform one’s self into a work of art at Coco Coquette Austin’s masquerade market.

Explore YOUR WORLD from home with KLRU’s locally produced Arts in Context. Did you know that this program is appears in 42% of US television markets? That’s because of viewer support from YOU. Austin is home to this short form documentary series exploring local artists, creative communities and conversations surrounding our city’s cultural scene.

And this August, we’re pledging to keep your regularly scheduled primetime shows, such as Arts in Context, on every night during our fund drive. We must raise $220,000 in 17 days and we’re counting on you to do your part to support the shows you rely on each week in order to meet this goal. Best of all, if we raise $220,000 before August 20th, we’ll end our drive 3 days early! Be sure and give a gift today – not only will your dollars be matched up to $100,000 we are offering an amazing incentive!

Give a gift via the form below for a chance to win 1 of 4 pairs of passes to Artist Den presents alt-J in theaters! And donating isn’t the only way to enter this giveaway – stay tuned to KLRU’s social media to share, tweet and post across your social media platforms for entry as well! Be sure to tag @klru and/or use #yourklru.

This week, Arts in Context Shorts takes you up handrails and down half-pipes to explore skateboarding culture in a new light.

Torque and Axis, an exciting new exhibit by artist Jared Steffensen, showcases the materials, shapes and movements generated by skateboarders as they travel through urban landscapes in innovative ways. Using bright colors, fluid lines and repurposed materials, the exhibit emphasizes the contemplative and imaginative aspects of skateboarding. Many of the exhibit’s sculptures highlight the beauty of skateboarding equipment while a film installation explores the perseverance skateboarders employ in their practice.

Presented by the Department of Art and Art History at the University of Texas, Torque and Axis pulls skateboarding into the art world with fascinating results.

Having survived under a totalitarian regime, Cuban hip-hop duo Krudas Cubensi refuses to compromise. Lyrically, nothing is off limits as they spit fiery lines about politics and sexuality with a frankness and openness that is seldom seen. With a persistent Afro-Cuban rhythm, Odaymara Cuesta and Olivia Prendes use their art as a weapon “to fight against oppression, for justice, for balance, for our rights, to celebrate the life.” Now based out of Austin, Texas, Krudas Cubensi continues their fight for social justice through their incendiary, original hip-hop.

This week’s Arts in Context Shorts features Ralph Eugene Meatyard’s eerie photographs that possess a “wildly strange” nature. Often employing masks, dolls and sometimes his own children set against abandoned buildings and other eerie backdrops, Meatyard’s work differed from the documentary, photo-journalism approach that defined the mainstream definition of the photographer in the 1950s. His photographs blur (often quite literally) the distinctions between literature and visual art, encouraging viewers to explore the role of fiction in the photographic images and their representation of reality.

This week’s Arts in Context Shorts features the work of artist Denise Prince. Across the disciplines of film, photography, painting and object making, Prince’s work employs the commercial language of advertising to make explicit what is real or deftly, its counterpoint, fantasy. Prince’s portrait on cancer survivor and apparel designer Gail Chovan is supplemented by wit and made clear the pleasure with which she constructs narratives and then disrupts them. Through the artistic process, Prince has learned to live better by uncovering the thing we are not.